What is Brad Steven's vision of NBA Basketball?

[PhoSita]

What about Robert Williams? Just let him walk?

What Roy is describing would likely require letting Smart and Rob Williams walk after the upcoming season. 

You could sign them to reasonable deals and then try to trade them at the deadline in 2023 or salary dump them on draft day.  But that's a tough position to put yourself in since an injury could totally ruin your plan, not to mention that teams will know what you want to do and will seek to gouge you.

[PhoSita]

If Brad is smart, by the 2023 off-season the only contracts on the books are Tatum, Brown, Nesmith and Pritchard.  That's a bit over $70 million in salary, with a projected $119 million cap.  Embiid is a free agent; maybe he's hoping to pair with a true superstar in Jayson Tatum at that point.

Is Tatum, Embiid, Brown, Nesmith, Pritchard, and a bunch of guys on small / minimum contracts actually a contender?

I think that would leave you with a similar problem to what the Celts have now -- they have multiple guys who can carry a load on offense, but they don't have a player who can really run the offense.  I don't really think that it works especially well in the modern NBA to tack on a veteran point guard like Rondo or Ricky Rubio and expect that offense to work especially well.  Your lead offensive creator needs to be a threat to score even if he's just your third or fourth option.

[Walker Wiggle]

If Brad is smart, by the 2023 off-season the only contracts on the books are Tatum, Brown, Nesmith and Pritchard.  That's a bit over $70 million in salary, with a projected $119 million cap.  Embiid is a free agent; maybe he's hoping to pair with a true superstar in Jayson Tatum at that point.

Is Tatum, Embiid, Brown, Nesmith, Pritchard, and a bunch of guys on small / minimum contracts actually a contender?

Yes, absolutely.

[PhoSita]

If Brad is smart, by the 2023 off-season the only contracts on the books are Tatum, Brown, Nesmith and Pritchard.  That's a bit over $70 million in salary, with a projected $119 million cap.  Embiid is a free agent; maybe he's hoping to pair with a true superstar in Jayson Tatum at that point.

Is Tatum, Embiid, Brown, Nesmith, Pritchard, and a bunch of guys on small / minimum contracts actually a contender?

Yes, absolutely.

1. I'm not so sure, especially given Embiid's injury issues (the only playoff run he's been healthy for was a 1st round sweep)

2. I really don't like the idea of all or nothing strategies based around targeting one specific player.  What are the Celtics left with if Embiid doesn't decide to come to Boston?  If the answer is "Beal" then they gave up two seasons to lock in as a dark horse contender (which they could've been all along).  If the answer is "nobody" then they're basically toast and will have to start considering a full rebuild.  Brown will be on the last guaranteed year of his deal.  Tatum will have just two years left.  The Celts won't have time to kick it over and try again in 2024.



My feeling is you really can't afford to take for granted any year in which you have a player like Tatum on your roster.  Particularly when you have a second player like Brown also under contract.  Every year they aren't putting themselves in a position to at least have a puncher's chance against the top teams in the conference in a seven game series is a wasted season. 

Sometimes you have to waste seasons because of mistakes made in the past, or bad luck.  Maybe Kemba's contract will hamstring the Celtics to that extent.  I sure hope not.

[86MaxwellSmart]

First order of business: Bring back Daniel Theis~!

[Celtics2021]

First order of business: Bring back Daniel Theis~!

Brad was planning on benching Theis before Thompson got Covid, so I’m not sure why you’d think this is something he’d be interested in doing.

[86MaxwellSmart]

First order of business: Bring back Daniel Theis~!

Brad was planning on benching Theis before Thompson got Covid, so I’m not sure why you’d think this is something he’d be interested in doing.

I was joking.

[Sophomore]

Injuries to Hayward and Kemba have made it really hard to put a contender together.

And that Kemba’s injury is a huge problem for the next two years. Solving that problem is a very big challenge.

[Sophomore]

It actually makes me wonder how many teams with genuine championship aspirations have been knocked out by injuries in recent years. Short answer: quite a few.

GSW is the most obvious. If Philly loses Embiid they go from legit contender to no chance at all. Losing Hayward in his first year was a total catastrophe for us; if we had fielded a healthy team that year I think we’d surely have gone to the finals, quite possibly won.

[hpantazo]

Injuries to Hayward and Kemba have made it really hard to put a contender together.

And that Kemba’s injury is a huge problem for the next two years. Solving that problem is a very big challenge.

Yeah, Kemba's chronic knee issue is a major problem. It will be interesting to see how Stevens the GM differs from Stevens the coach, and if he has the guts to dump Kemba. As coach, he praised Kemba to no end, but he's got to see the writing on the wall better than anyone at this point that Kemba's knee is shot and it will only get worse.

[Sophomore]

Injuries to Hayward and Kemba have made it really hard to put a contender together.

And that Kemba’s injury is a huge problem for the next two years. Solving that problem is a very big challenge.

Yeah, Kemba's chronic knee issue is a major problem. It will be interesting to see how Stevens the GM differs from Stevens the coach, and if he has the guts to dump Kemba. As coach, he praised Kemba to no end, but he's got to see the writing on the wall better than anyone at this point that Kemba's knee is shot and it will only get worse.

The hard thing to me is - how do you dump kemba without paying so much you’re even worse off. Who’s going to take that contract and what will they demand?

I legit don’t know what they can do. At least for a minute it looked like he was healthy - that might have restored some of his value. Then he got hurt again.

[hpantazo]

Injuries to Hayward and Kemba have made it really hard to put a contender together.

And that Kemba’s injury is a huge problem for the next two years. Solving that problem is a very big challenge.

Yeah, Kemba's chronic knee issue is a major problem. It will be interesting to see how Stevens the GM differs from Stevens the coach, and if he has the guts to dump Kemba. As coach, he praised Kemba to no end, but he's got to see the writing on the wall better than anyone at this point that Kemba's knee is shot and it will only get worse.

The hard thing to me is - how do you dump kemba without paying so much you’re even worse off. Who’s going to take that contract and what will they demand?

I legit don’t know what they can do. At least for a minute it looked like he was healthy - that might have restored some of his value. Then he got hurt again.

Teams have managed to trade 'untradeable' contracts worse than Kemba's in the past few years without wildly overpaying. I think there will be teams who strike out in free agency and want to take a chance on a guy like Kemba, and don't really have many other guys to use the cap space on.

Kemba's got a positive attitude and vet experience that could serve as a good guide to younger teams.